Many pleasure boaters, both sail and power, have recently become extremely interested in carrying a radar on their boats. The present relative affordability of radar sets suitable for pleasure boats has made them a viable accessory for use as a navigation tool and for the inherent safety of being able to identify shore features such as a harbor or boat traffic on the water at times of low or reduced visibility such as a nighttime, fog, haze, etc. Therefore many owners of sailboats and power boats are desirous of installing a radar.
All radar units include a rotating antenna that is attached to a base. The rotating antenna is generally covered with a random when installed on a sailboat so as not to interfere with halyards and other lines, and the antenna may be left uncovered for installation on a powerboat where this is not a problem. The antenna assembly must be mounted as high as possible on a boat in order to obtain good range with the unit. For sailboats and many powerboats, this necessitates that the antenna be carried on a vertical spar, such as a mast on a sailboat or a spar used for a flag hoist or a steadying sail on a powerboat. This in turn requires some type of support that can be attached to a spar and which will be adapted to mount a radar antenna. So far as I am aware, the prior art mounts for such purpose most generally have been custom-made for each boat or radar antenna and often have been one piece units of cast or welded construction. This is unsatisfactory as it results in a significant expense to the boat owner to have a special mount made for his/her particular boat, and also presents problems for a boatyard that may be asked to fabricate or install a mount.
My present invention was developed in response to the need for a kit for attaching to a spar to provide a mount for a radar antenna. I have designed and tested a kit for spar mounted radar antenna mount that can be attached to spars of varying widths, so as to thereby provide a universal kit suitable for many sizes of spars and adapted to mount numerous models of radar antennas.